Hollywood-Style Studio Would Be 'Jaigantic' For Fair Haven

NEW HAVEN, CT — It’s been 20 years since the city created the River Street Municipal Development Plan. The industrial area of Fair Haven remains pockmarked with the remnants of a bygone industrial era but is also peppered with newish light industrial sites.

By summer's-end, if all goes to plan, a block of River Street, where it meets Poplar Street, will have a gigantic revitalization. It’s the location for actor, director, writer and former Connecticut resident Michael Jai White’s Jaigantic Studios.

As Patch reported last week, White is bringing his “mini major” film studio to New Haven, the Fair Haven neighborhood in particular.

Read more here: 'Jaigantic' News: Michael Jai White To Open Studio In New Haven

New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker confirmed the city and White are advancing on an agreement for the proposed movie studio.

“We see many opportunities and neighborhood benefits for future development that may occur there,” Elicker told Patch in an emailed statement confirming reporting by the New Haven Register on the site for White’s proposed studio.

Meanwhile, White’s Jaigantic Studios has emblazoned “Coming summer 2021,” on its website’s cover photo.

So, it’s happening. The details need to be ironed out officials said and, as reported, will need approvals and an OK from the Board of Alders.

“The River Street corridor has incredible potential because of its access to the water and access to a diverse and vibrant neighborhood,” Elicker said.

Jaigantic Studio productions will include movies, TV and commercial projects, according to a news release. The studio will include more than a dozen soundstages and “motion capture stages, which will feature 360-degree virtual production volumes.” The site will also house production and post-production offices, studios and support facilities.

“White’s venture aims to solidify New Haven as a primary entertainment market by combining Connecticut’s favorable film and TV tax incentives with the tri-state area’s talent pool, innovative technology and turnkey production facilities,” a news release and report reads.

Once completed, White’s Jaigantic Studios hopes to employ hundreds, with a goal to employ local people, and create opportunities for aspiring filmmakers including serving as an "accessible industry hub for students of Yale University’s drama school.”

Jaigantic Studios chief impact officer and New Haven resident Jackie Buster told the Registerthat the hope is to see the studio an “entertainment center” anchored in Fair Haven.

Jaigantic Studios: ‘Where heroes rise’

White, a renowned martial artist in addition to being a film and TV star, created Jaigantic Studios, a “ high octane production company,” to create film television and commercial content he says is “Dedicated to developing, producing, and distributing high-end content focused on positive heroes and powerful narratives set in the genres of action, drama, and comedy.”

Brooklyn-born but raised in Bridgeport, White, 53, attended Southern Connecticut State University and has close ties to New Haven.

Variety reported he "long wanted to return to his home state to expand the industry with a studio that will provide jobs, professional training and apprenticeships for the local community."

White has been featured in scores of film, TV and theatrical productions, and music videos as well as voice actor for video games and web series over the course of his decades-long career. His first time on film was in 1989’s superhero comedy Toxic Avenger. His remake of Jean Claude Van Damme’s Sudden Death, titled Welcome to Sudden Death, hit Netflix last year and was one of its “most-watched” movies, Forbes reported.

White is the first African-American to play a comic book superhero in a major motion picture; he played Al Simmons in the 1997 blockbuster Spawn.

And he played Jax Briggs in Mortal Kombat: Legacy and portrayed boxer Mike Tyson in HBO's 1995 film Tyson.

White, whose film and TV credits are voluminous, has seven martial arts black belts and dozens of martial arts titles.

Read more about White here.

And more about Jaigantic Studios here.